Thursday, February 14, 2013

Knowledge Production Project

"Bassam
Haddad, director of the Middle East Studies Program at George Mason University,
put forth another challenge, declaring: “The mainstream discourse in the United
States on the Middle East can be more important than what is actually going on
in the Middle East itself.” By that he was referring to the simplistic and
biased narrative collectively written by American scholars and journalists that
influences or reinforces American policy for the Middle East and that in turn
has had profound consequences for the region. He pointed to cynical shifts in
U.S. media coverage of the Arab Spring. “Reports, analysis and writings on the
uprisings in the United States during the first few months spoke of masses that
defied authoritarian rule by going to streets and risking life and limb,” he
explained. “However, there was no pre-designated location or space in the
mainstream discourse to put these images, so they floated, un-theorized. No
sooner than the uprisings became messy, chaotic, and violent, we began to
detect a different trend. The media in the United States went full circle to
interpret the meaning of the uprisings through the good old perennial lens.”
Haddad told the gathering about an effort he is leading to address the problem
of the distorted narrative, the Knowledge Production Project, which aims to
accumulate and catalogue all material produced in the U.S. concerning the
Middle East. The project will include everything from think tank policy papers
and academic analyses to popular films and literature, collected in a database
that will permit, he said, new inquiries into the connections between these
plural centers of knowledge production and the development of U.S. foreign
policy."

Comic by Terry Furry, reproduced from "Heard the One About the Funny Leftist?" by Cris Thompson, East Bay Express

As'ad's Bio

As'ad AbuKhalil, born March 16, 1960. From Tyre, Lebanon, grew up in Beirut. Received his BA and MA from American University of Beirut in pol sc. Came to US in 1983 and received his PhD in comparative government from Georgetown University. Taught at Tufts University, Georgetown University, George Washington University, Colorado College, and Randolph-Macon Woman's College. Served as a Scholar-in-Residence at Middle East Institute in Washington DC. He served as free-lance Middle East consultant for NBC News and ABC News, an experience that only served to increase his disdain for maintream US media. He is now professor of political science at California State University, Stanislaus. His favorite food is fried eggplants.

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